Laetitia Pilkington
Laetitia Pilkington (1712 - 29 August 1750) was an Irish poet and memorist, best known today for her reminiscences of Jonathan Swift. Life Pilkington was born Laetitia Van Lewen at Dublin in 1712, the second child of Dr. Van Lewen, a man-midwife of Dutch origin, who was educated at Leyden under Boerhaave, and had settled in Dublin about 1710. A precocious child, Lætitia was greatly indulged by her father, whom, in 1729, she persuaded to allow her to marry a penniless Irish parson named Matthew Pilkington, the son of a watchmaker. They lived upon the bounty of Van Lewen, until Pilkington obtained the post of chaplain to Lady Charlemont. Shortly after this event, about 1730, with the help of Dr. Delany's influence Pilkington and his wife pushed themselves into Swift's favour. Swift was then living in Dublin as dean of St. Patrick's, and he seems to have been taken by Lætitia's wit, docility, and freedom from affectation.Seccombe, 295. The story of her introduction to the dean, as told afterwards by Mrs. Pilkington, is full of humorous entertainment. "Is this poor little child married?" was Swift's first remark. "God help her!" In the evening Swift made her read to him his own Annals of the Four Last Years of Queen Anne, asking her most particularly whether she understood every word; for, said he, ‘I would have it intelligent to the meanest capacity; and if you comprehend it, 'tis possible everybody may."Seccombe, 296. For a time she was undoubtedly a great favourite of Swift, and her sprightly reminiscences, in spite of the disdain with which they are treated by some of Swift's biographers, constitute one of the chief sources of authority as to Swift's later years. It is Mrs. Pilkington who tells us of Swift's personal habits, of his manners with his servants, of his dealings with roguish workmen, of his memory of Hudibras, so accurate that he could repeat every line from beginning to end. Thackeray was quite justified in the extensive use he made of her anecdotes in his sketch of Swift in English Humourists, for the internal evidence of their authenticity is quite conclusive. The apologetic portions of her memoirs are much less worthy of credence. The latter half of Mrs. Pilkington's life was extremely unfortunate. In 1732 Swift procured her husband an appointment in London, where he went without his wife. Literary jealousies are said to have alienated the pair. Later, however, Mrs. Pilkington joined her husband, and, according to her own account, found him living a life of profligacy. She soon returned to Ireland, with her own reputation somewhat tarnished. Her father died in 1734, and she shortly afterwards gave her husband a good pretext for ridding himself of his wife, being found entertaining a man in her bedroom between 2 and 3 o'clock in the morning. Swift, writing to Alderman Barber, put her case in a nutshell: "She was taken in the fact by her own husband; he is now suing for a divorce and will not get it; she is suing for a maintenance, and he has none to give her." After strange adventures she came to England and settled in London. Colley Cibber interested himself in her story, and she managed for a time to beg sufficient for a livelihood. In 1748, however, she was sued for debt and imprisoned in the Marshalsea. Upon her release, again owing to the good offices of Cibber, she set to work to compile her Memoirs, and doubtless did not spare any efforts to blackmail some of her old patrons. The work first appeared at Dublin, in two volumes, as Memoirs of Mrs. Lætitia Pilkington, wife to the Rev. Matthew Pilkington, written by herself. Wherein are occasionally interspersed all her Poems, with Anecdotes of several eminent persons living and dead (1748). The work attracted a fair amount of attention, and the portions relating to Swift were extensively pillaged by newspapers and magazines; a 3rd edition appeared at London in 1754, with an additional volume edited by her son, John Carteret Pilkington. Among those who befriended her in her last years were Samuel Richardson, Sir Robert King, and Lord Kingsborough. After launching her Memoirs, Mrs. Pilkington started a small bookshop in St. James's Street, but the venture does not seem to have succeeded, for she once more made her way over to Ireland, and died in Dublin on 29 Aug. 1750. Writing Virginia Woolf described Pilkington as "“a very extraordinary cross between Moll Flanders and Lady Ritchie, between a rolling and rollicking woman of the town and a lady of breeding and refinement.” The Poetry Foundation says that her Memoirs "provide an invaluable glimpse into 18th-century literary society and the ironies, struggles, and disappointments of female writers attempting to make their way through it."Laetitia Pilkington 1708-1750, Poetry Foundation. Web, Mar. 17, 2017. The celebrated Mrs. Pilkington's Jests, or The cabinet of wit and humour, was published posthumously in 1751; 2nd edition, with additions, 1765. It was claimed for this curious repertory of the broadest jests that when in manuscript it had been perused by Swift, and had elicited from him a laugh. In her Memoirs, however, Mrs. Pilkington explicitly states that she had never seen Swift laugh. Her burlesque, entitled The Turkish Court; or, The London prentice, which was acted at Capel Court, Dublin, in 1748, was never printed. Recognition Her poems were included in Poems by Eminent Ladies (2 volumes. London, 1755). Publications Poetry *Poems in Poems by Eminent Ladies. London: Baldwin, 1755. *''The Poetry of Laetitia Pilkington (1712-1750) and Constantia Grierson (1706-1733)'' (edited by Bernard Tucker). Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 1996. Non-fiction *''Memoirs'' (2 volumes), Dublin: privately published, 1748; London: R. Griffiths & G. Woodfall. 1748. **(edited by A.C. Elias). Athens. GA: University of Georgia Press, 1997. *''The Third and Last Volume of the Memoirs''. London: R. Griffiths, 1754. *''Mrs. Pilkington's Jests; or, The cabinet of wit and humour''. London: Mr. Kinnersley / Langford / Jones / et al, 1759; London: W. Nicoll, 1764. Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.Search results = au:Laetitia Pilkington, WorldCat, OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc. Web, Sep. 6, 2016. See also *List of Irish poets References * . Wikisource, Web, Sep. 5, 2016. Notes External links ;Poems *"Written on Her Death-bed" in A Book of Women's Verse *Song: "Strephon, your breach of faith and trust" *Laetitia Pilkington at AllPoetry *Laetitia Pilkington 1708-1750 at the Poetry Foundation *Laetitia Pilkington at Poetry Nook (62 poems) ;About *"Laetitia Pilkington, Her Serene Highness Of Lilliput" at History and Other Thoughts *"Was Laetitia Pilkington too clever for her own good?", review of Queen of the Wits * Pilkington, Laetitia Category:1712 births Category:1750 deaths Category:18th-century poets Category:18th-century women writers Category:English-language poets Category:Irish poets Category:Irish women writers Category:People from Dublin (city) Category:Poets Category:Women poets